2.1. Installing VLC

There are VLC binaries available for the many OSes, but not for
all supported OSes. If there are no binaries for your OS or if you want
to change the default settings, you can compile VLC from sources.

2.1.1. Windows

VLC works under Windows 95/98/ME/2000/XP.
Download the self-extracting file from the VLC Windows
download page. Launch the .exe to install
VLC.

2.1.2. BeOS

2.1.3. Mac OS X

Download the Mac OS X package from the VLC
MacOS X download page . Double-click on the icon of the
package : an icon will appear on your Desktop, right beside your
drive(s). Open it and drag the VLC application from the resulting
window to the place where you want to install it (it should be
/Applications).

2.1.4.3. Debian testing (sarge)

You should not be using Debian testing unless you perfectly know
what you are doing. It is almost impossible to support Debian testing
and there are no plans to do it.
For more informations on Debian testing, please look:
testing page

2.1.5. Linux Mandrake

There are VLC packages for Mandrake 9.1 and cooker.

To install them, add the following
sources for either Mandrake 9.1 or Cooker (you can use Easy urpmi for that):
contrib from the core distribution and
plf (Penguin Liberation Front) from the external
add-ons.

2.1.6. Linux Redhat

Download the RPM package vlc and the packages
listed in the required libraries and codecs
section (the other packages are just optional) from the VLC Red Hat
download page and put them all into the same directory.

Then install the RPM packages you have downloaded:

# rpm -U *.rpm

If you have not installed all the RPM packages included with your
distribution, you may be asked to install a few of them first.

2.1.7. Compile the sources by yourself (for every other OS)

The method below is for any Unix system supported by VLC, for
which there is no packages available. It explains how to compile and
install VLC and the needed libraries from their source code.

You can also compile VLC under Linux this way if you want to
modify the default supported modules.

2.1.7.1. Install the libraries

Many libraries are needed :

libdvbpsi
(compulsory)
,

mpeg2dec
(compulsory)
,

libdvdcss
if you want to be able to read encrypted DVDs
,

libdvdplay
if you want to have DVD menu navigation
,

a52dec
if you want to be able to decode the AC3 (i.e. A52)
sound format often used in DVDs
,